Writing Contests, Grants & Awards

The Writing Contests, Grants & Awards database includes details about the creative writing contests—including poetry contests, short story competitions, essay contests, awards for novels, and more—that we’ve published in Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it. Ours is the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.

Two nine-month residencies at Colgate University, including a stipend of $40,500, health benefits, and travel expenses, are given annually to poets, fiction writers, or nonfiction writers. The 20172018...

An academic year in residence, which includes a stipend of at least $30,000, at the University of Wisconsin in Madison is given annually to up to six writers working on a first or second book of poetry...

Grants of $25,000 each are awarded in alternating years to poets and prose writers. This year grants will be awarded to prose writers. Fiction and creative nonfiction writers who have published at least...

Two residencies, cosponsored by the Texas Institute of Letters, at a rural retreat west of Austin are given annually to writers who are native Texans, who have lived in Texas for at least three years, or...